Everlasting Bond (14 page)

Getting ready for school, Katrina felt her world was falling apart. The past week had been one of the toughest ones she’s had. The argument at the cottage replayed itself in her head constantly. She wondered if she had overreacted, but quickly assured herself that wasn’t the case. After all
, he lied to her; it wasn’t the other way around.

Even still, her heart was ripped into pieces. She couldn’t even eat. Her stomach was torn into knots. Like a zombie, she had gone through her morning routine all week long and it was st
arting to take its toll on her.

Walking down the stairs and into the kitchen, she tried to seem cheerful. The last thing she wanted was her mother knowing about he
r problems. She was lucky—her mother was nowhere in sight. Jake was the only one in the kitchen.

She walked over to the fruit basket and grabbed the first apple she saw. Turning around, she leaned against the cabi
net and stared at her brother.

Jake didn’t say a word or look at her. Katrina could feel the tension emanating off of him. It was so thick, she practically drowned in it.
She supposed it was her fault.

After her argument with Cole, things between her and Jake were also on rocky ground. He felt like he was torn in the middle and Katrina could understand that. She knew it wasn’t fair for him to have t
o choose between her and Andrew.

“Hey,” Katrina attempted small talk.

“Hi,” Jake’s cold voice hit her hard. He never even looked up at her. Instead, he kept his face buried down towards the table.

“Jake, can we talk?”

“About what?” He continued chewing his cereal, barely giving her a second thought.

“Come on. You know what?”

“Oh, that. What about it?”

“Are you still mad at me?”

“Mad at you? No.” He turned in his chair and gave her a hard look. “Disappointed, very.”

“Why?”

“You know why!”

“That’s not fair.”

“Isn’t it?”

“Jake, please d
on’t do this.”

Pleading with her brother, Katrina felt his anger start to soften. He opened his mouth to speak, but the doorbell rang ending their conversation.

“I have to go.” He turned and walked away.

“Hello, handsome.” Hearing Andrew’s cocky voice, Katrina’s stomach turned. Cole was right outside. She stood in the kitchen and waited until they shut the door.

Peeking out the kitchen window, she watched the car make its way onto the road before she got in the truck and drove herself to school.

Shutting the truck door, she found Stacy waiting patiently. Katrina didn’t have to say anything. Stacy just knew what was wrong. Tears began to fall down Katrina’s face.

“Oh, sweetie. I’m so sorry.” Stacy wrapped Katrina in a tight hug. “Boys can really suck sometimes.”

“Yeah, they do,” Katrina’s muffled voice said.

“Whatever it is, we’ll get through it together.”

“Thanks.” Guilt flooded Katrina and she cried harder. She had only told Stacy the partial truth about her and Cole’s fight. There was no way she could have told her all of it and that made her feel even worse.

“Kat, it’ll be okay. I promise.”

“I hope you’re
right.” Wiping the tears away, Katrina pulled herself together and followed Stacy into class.

“Of course I am,” Stacy ga
ve her a soft reassuring smile.

In Geometry, everything went by in a big messy blur. Katrina hated having Cole sit behind her. It was a curse.

Soon it was time for PE. Dressed and out of the locker room, she was walking out onto the field with Stacy wondering what Coach Cooper had planned for them. Since he was also the school’s football coach, he often liked to torment all of his students with the same torturous method.

“Everyone line up!” Coach Cooper’s deep voice shouted. At the sound of his voice all of the
chatter died down into silence.

With his balding widow’s peak, his carrot red hair wasn’t as noticeable. Coach Cooper was the stereotypical gym teacher. He always wore the unofficial uniform: gym shorts and a plain grey T-shirt complete with the annoying whistle always draped around his neck.

“Today, we’re going to divide into teams. Half of you over here and the other half over there,” he motioned with his hands for the class to split up. “And I want an even mixture of boys and girls.”

Katrina walked over to the left side of the field with Stacy and waited. Her heart sank and she let out a moan in protest when he brought out the football. She had a hard enough time walking a straight line. Now, he wanted her to run and not get tackled on top of it. Katrina swore sometimes he lived for t
he humiliation of his students.

Of course she heard Mason and the other guys cheer in excitement. This only made her dilemma worse. Tackle football was forbidden during class time, but that never stopped the guys from playing rough.

“Psst, Kat.” Stacy tapped her on the shoulder.

“What?”

“You’ll do fine. Don’t worry so much.” Stacy gave her a friendly nudge.

“Right.” Katrina wasn’t convinced.

“Mason, you and Robby are team captains and make sure everyone participates.” Coach Cooper always put his jock heads in charge. She really hated favoritism.

“Sure thing, Coach,” Mason scoffed at Katrina.

Katrina knew this wasn’t going to be a good day. She was relieved Mason wasn’t her team captain and she wouldn’t have to deal with his yelling. The down side was he’d be running straight for her if she caught the ball.

In the huddle, Katrina tried to focus on everything Robby said, but she couldn’t. Her mind was too distracted by Mason sneering over his shoulder at her. He was always ready to pounce on her or Jake any chance he could. No wonder
he and Brody were best friends.

“Kat!” Robby’s voice interrupted her thoughts.

“Yeah?” She turned and found his hazel eyes staring at her.

“Are you paying attention?”

“Sort of.”

Robby gave her a long look and shook his brunette head at her. “Just run, that way,” he pointed towards the end of the field. “I’ll throw it to
Dallas.” He pointed to the sandy blonde jock.

“Sure.” Katrina looked at
Dallas. He was as big as the rest of the football team. That was a huge sigh of relief for her. He must have picked up on her nerves because one of his hazel eyes winked at her as he gave her a quick smile.

“Positions!” Robby yelled, clapping his hands.

Here we go.
She tried to psych herself up, but her nerves were getting the best of her. Katrina stood by the rest of her classmates. She never really understood football, so she pretended as best she could. When they hiked the ball, she took off running like Robby told her. It worked until she got to the halfway point and heard her name.

“Kat!” She turned and found
Dallas lying in the grass with another huge jock on top of him. That’s when Robby threw the ball right to her. “Catch.”

Luckily she caught it and was quite proud of herself for a few seconds. Then the screaming of her teammates distracted her back to the awful truth. She’d caught the ball and Mason was headed straight towards her.

Katrina felt herself pick up speed. The goal was only a few yards away and her face lit up in excitement. She took her mind off everything else and focused on reaching it. She got to the last yard when she looked back and saw what she thought were two yellow eyes in the distance.

That little distraction was all Mason needed. He slammed into her and knocked her body to the ground. Katrina landed on her wrist and heard a loud “snap” followed by excruciating pain.

“Tell your brother payback’s a bitch!” Mason whispered in her ear, before he got up. The release of his added weight caused her arm to move and that wasn’t good.

“OUCH!” Katrina screamed and cradled her arm. The pain was so bad she tried to take deep breaths to keep herself togeth
er, but it wasn't working.

“Kat!” Stacy ran over to help.

“I can’t move my arm,” Katrina exhaled a deep moan of agony. The throbbing was so bad her vision started to blur and she felt like she was going to vomit.

“Take her to the office,” she heard Coach Cooper say, as his voice grew closer.

Stacy helped her to her feet and that’s when the pain grew worse. Katrina winced in pain. She tried to focus on Stacy and what she was saying, but she couldn’t. Everything in the distance was growing silent and she felt her vision narrow into a dark tunnel.

“What’s wrong with her skin? She’s pale and cold. Is she dying?” Stacy went into hysterics.

“She’s going into shock,” Coach Cooper said. “We need to get her to the nurse.”

Both of their voices were sounding distant and unrecognizable in her foggy haze. She tried to make sense of their conversation, but her head was spinning. The only thing she remembered was leaning against Stacy.

Still clutching her wrist, Katrina could hear Stacy babbling, but none of it made any sense. Her body was drunk on pain and any of her normal functions weren’t working properly. Then everything faded into darkness.

*    *    *

“Kat, honey
, can you hear me?” her mother’s voice shouted, as Katrina felt someone jerking her body back and forth. “Honey, move if you can hear me?”

Katrina opened her eyes and found her mothers frantic hazel eyes staring at her. “What happened?” Her voice was very weak and her throat extremely dry.

“The school called me. You hurt your wrist and passed out in shock.”

“Right.” Katrina’s eyes looked over at her wrist.

It was covered in white gauze. The throbbing wasn’t as bad as it had been earlier, but she could still feel the tenderness.

“Come on
, sweetie.” Katrina’s mom helped her sit up. “We need to take you to Dr. Aldrich and have him look at that.”

“Where’s Stacy?”

“They sent her back to class. She sure made a huge fuss about it though.”

“Oh.” Katrina couldn’t mutter much else. She was still weak from passing out.

Inside her mom’s station wagon, Katrina laid her head back and closed her eyes. She never opened them until she felt the car slow down and pull into the office parking lot. Her mom came around and carefully helped her walk towards the building. They were halfway to the door, when Katrina saw the door open and Alaric standing there.

“
Come in,” his calm voice said.

Katrina’s mom finished helping her the rest of the way through the door and inside. The office looked much different than she remembered. Then again it could be her nerves. Having Alaric tend to her while she’s not speaking to his son was a bit strange.

“Hello. I’m Alaric Aldrich.” Alaric reached out his hand towards her mother.

“I’m Aileen. Aileen Davenport,” her mother’s voice cracked, as she took it.

“It’s nice to finally meet you.”

“Same here.” Her mother was doing her best cheesy smile.

“Come through here and I’ll have a look at your wrist.” Alaric turned and led them into his office.

As his back was to them
, her mother mouthed a silent “He’s hot” to her. Katrina gave her an uncomfortable grin and kept walking. Her mother could be real embarrassing sometimes. Katrina just hoped Alaric hadn’t noticed or heard her.

They turned right and went through a small doorway. Katrina was curious on how he redecorated the office. Last time she was there to see Dr. Fenton, it smelled like moth bal
ls and everything was outdated.

Inside, she was pleasantly surprised. It was very tidy for an office. Everything was neatly tucked in its place. There was no overflow of papers smothering the desk, as would be the case in her mother’s house. A bulky Mahogany desk was placed in left corner of the large room. There were numerous paintings hung on the sizeable walls. Some looked like they could ha
ve belonged to Picasso himself.

“Have a seat, right here.” He motioned for her to sit on a recliner with a stool next to the desk.

Katrina hoisted herself up with one arm and Alaric’s help. Her mother took a seat in one of the black chairs next to her.

Alaric took the seat in front of Katrina and her heart started to race. She hated anything to do with doctors. The thought of them made her queasy. Even when her mother used to make her come to see Dr. Fenton
, she would protest. At least, Alaric had managed to update the equipment and these new chairs wouldn’t collapse on her.

“Let’s see what we have here.” The doctor carefully unwrapped her gauze and Katrina could feel the throbbing in her wrist return.

“Ouch!” Katrina said, as she felt him hold her wrist.

“Now, this is going to hurt a little,” he warned.

Katrina shouted while he gently moved her wrist back and forth.
A little! It hurt like hell!